Corruption scheme in Poltava: officials purchased quadcopters with a 5-million kickback for budget funds
23 January 16:20
Top officials of the Poltava City Council “used” UAH 39 million of budget funds to purchase drones at inflated prices. This was reported by the press service of the Bureau of Economic Security, according to Komersant ukrainskyi.
The director of the Civil Protection Department and his subordinate are charged under Part 2 of Article 364 (abuse of power or official position) and Part 1 of Article 366 (forgery) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
The scheme was simple: in late December, the director of the department and his subordinate organized the purchase of drones for military units. But the equipment was purchased for UAH 5 million more than the market price. In total, the “fake” purchase cost the budget UAH 39 million.
Officials and the head of the supplier company have now been notified of suspicion. Two of them have been placed under house arrest by the court.
Читайте нас у Telegram: головні новини коротко
An army of drones
The decision to maximize state support for the production of drones was made in March 2023, when the government approved a resolution. Since then, the Ministry of Digital Transformation has been actively working to expand production, maximize support for drone manufacturers, and remove bureaucratic obstacles to the creation of UAVs. Minister Fedorov launched the People’s Drone initiative, under which every citizen can assemble a drone at home at their own expense.
In late 2023, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy expressed confidence that Ukraine would produce one million drones for the frontline by 2024, referring to FPV drones. In his last article in the Western press on the eve of his dismissal from the post of Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Valeriy Zaluzhnyi emphasized the need for a technological breakthrough in the army with a special focus on unmanned technologies. The Commander-in-Chief claimed that it would take only 5 months to reorient the army to unmanned systems.
After his dismissal, Supreme Commander-in-Chief Volodymyr Zelenskyy instructed the government to work on the creation of a separate type of troops in the Armed Forces – the Unmanned Systems Forces. They were formally established on February 6, 2024.
As it turned out, the plan of 1 million drones was exceeded. There is no official figure, but the ones that have been mentioned are quite satisfactory. For example, at the end of October last year, First Deputy Defense Minister Ivan Havryliuk said that the plan of 1 million FPV drones had been exceeded, as well as all other plans for unmanned systems. That is, more than 10,000 medium-range strike drones and more than a thousand drones with a range of a thousand kilometers or more were also created.
At the same time, according to DroneUA co-founder Valeriy Yakovenko, the deputy minister was referring only to drones purchased by the state. All in all, Yakovenko says, Ukraine has produced about 4 million drones for the frontline. Of these, 2.8 million drones were delivered to the front by volunteers and commercial entities.
